The present invention relates to a printing system equipped with a function to administrate the use of printing and copying, a printer, an administrating device for the number of printed sheets, and a program.
In a printing system in which a printer, a copying machine, and so on are connected with a server via a network, there is a system constituted such that the server administrates accounts of prints and copies and restriction of use for each ID (identification).
With regard to the administration of the use of a printer and a copier, according the technique disclosed in Japanese Patent Unexamined Publication No. 11-205498 as one example, a sever counts the number of actually printed and outputted sheets in a printing job and a copying job for each ID and then administrates unitary for those jobs. Further, according to the technique disclosed in Japanese Patent Unexamined Publication No. 2003-150355 as one example, when a sever receives a printing job or a copying job, the server predicts the number of printed sheets before executing printing, compares it with the number of remaining sheets (the number of printable remaining sheets) corresponding to the user ID having requested the job, and limits the printing if the number of remaining sheets is smaller than the predicted one. Further, with this technique, the server is adapted to renew the number of remaining sheets of the user by the number of sheets actually printed and outputted by a printer.
In each of the above mentioned techniques, the administration of the number of sheets is conducted on the basis of the number of sheets (count of jobs, or log information) which were actually printed and outputted, the number of sheets (the number of reserved sheets) to be used for a job (standby job) waiting for being executed is not taken into consideration. Therefore, there is a possibility that the limitation of the number of sheets cannot be conducted correctly for a job processed at the time that the number of sheets becomes small.
For example, in the case where plural jobs by the same ID are waiting, in particular, in the case where a job to print a large number of sheets is waiting, a next job is permitted before the actual number of sheet of the standby job is reflected to the administration, the possibility that the number of remaining sheets (the upper limit of the number of sheets) is exceed by the printing of the job becomes high.
Therefore, it is required to provide a printing system, a printing apparatus, an administrating device of the number of printed sheets, and a program with which it is possible to make the possibility to permit printing in excess of the limitation of the number of sheets low by the administration of the number of sheets including the number of reserved sheets on the waiting condition for being executed and outputted.